EP0037785B1 - Device for attenuating the noises emitted by an artificial anus - Google Patents

Abstract

A device reducing noise resulting from the emission of intestinal gas by persons who have undergone enterostomy. Basically, it comprises an oblong body made of an open-cell porous material and/or optionally provided with an absorbent material, such as activated charcoal, and sheathed in a casing made of a material that does ot adhere to the stoma walls, and the upstream and downstream portions of which each comprises at least one opening suited to allow passage of the intestinal gases emitted, and which can be connected to a collecting bag, or secured to the stoma of persons practising irrigation. Application to improving the comfort and the social rehabilitation of persons who have undergone enterostomy.

Description

The present invention relates to the suppression or attenuation of noises emitted by an artificial anus.

Enterostomized patients, in particular co-lostomized and ileostomized, have an intestinal opening opening into the abdominal wall. The ejection of intestinal residues most often escapes the control of these patients.

As a rule, the collection of materials is carried out in plastic bags, which are fixed on the patient's abdomen by adhesives or by joints, most often in natural or synthetic gum, associated with a belt system.

Such bag systems effectively collect solids or liquids under acceptable conditions, but they are ineffective with respect to gases emitted by the intestinal system.

Enterostomics practicing colonic irrigation encounter the same problem, in particular on the second day following the enema.

These gaseous emissions are unpredictable and uncontrollable, and are usually accompanied by noise as they pass through the stoma.

The resulting state of affairs represents a considerable embarrassment for enterostomics and hinders their social reintegration.

We have certainly already described systems for the evacuation and deodorization of the gases emitted in enterostomized patients. Thus, for some time, various filter systems glued or welded to collection bags for enterostomies have been proposed for this purpose (see in particular FR-A-2 331 549); but, by their very design, they cannot contribute to eliminating the noise emissions from the artificial anus and it is obvious that this objective was not aimed at when they were developed.

On the other hand, closure systems have been proposed, in particular magnetic, ensuring a certain attenuation of the noise emitted by an ostomy on and / or in which such a closure system is inserted (see in this regard, inter alia, FR -A-2 417 291 and FR-A-2 410 899, and patent US-A-2 931 353). However, these closure devices can only be worn in place of the abovementioned collection bags by enterostomized patients who irrigate and / or whose stools are very well controlled, that is to say regular. This only corresponds to a minority of enterostomies.

As a result, no solution to the problem of noise emitted by an ostomy has been proposed so far for ostomates who use collection bags. However, this type of patient represents the largest majority of ostomates.

We can even say overall that, until now, no system exists specifically to solve the problems posed by the noise emissions of an artificial anus, and the systems for the evacuation and deodorization of the gases described so far in association with ostomy collection bags do not in themselves attenuate the sound emissions coming from the artificial anus to which these pockets are applied.

In addition, even if some have sought to associate with these collection bags devices such as those which can possibly attenuate the noises a little and which are part of certain known closure systems, as indicated above, this has absolutely no effect. allowed to provide users with a device attenuating the sounds emitted by the artificial anus as well of ostomates practicing the irrigation as of those not practicing it, and ensuring at the same time a good evacuation of the stools of all these enterostomized. A device attenuating the sounds emitted by an ostomy is indeed acceptable only if it does not interfere with the free passage of stools and their collection.

We have now found that all of these objectives can be achieved by means of a device according to claim 1.

Such a device has in fact been shown to be capable both of ensuring relaxation of the gases emitted and of keeping the intestinal walls constantly apart; it is by these two combined actions that it can eliminate any sound emission by the stoma. It has also been noted that this device is beneficial in preventing any stenosis of the stoma.

The device according to the invention protects the patient against noise emissions until the emission of a saddle; this operates normally and takes place after the evacuation of the device put in place in the stoma. The fact that this device can be easily rejected either manually or even without external intervention other than that of the stool, according to the embodiments, constitutes an additional advantage.

As a variant, this device can also contribute to deodorizing the gases emitted and, for this purpose, it has proved very advantageous to provide the cells of the porous material with open cells with a charge of deodorizing material, such as for example carbon. active.

The invention therefore also relates to a device as described above and in which at least part of the cells of the porous open cell material contains a charge of absorbent material, such as activated carbon.

This charge of absorbent material can be introduced into the cells by any means known to those skilled in the art and can, if necessary, be fixed there by conventional means, in particular by an appropriate resin.

• Fig. 1 représente une vue schématique en coupe d'une variante de ce dispositif, également en place dans une stomie portant une poche de recueil, et associé à celle-ci.
• Fig. 2 représente une vue schématique en coupe d'une variante du dispositif de la figure 1, dans laquelle la fixation du corps oblong est réalisée sur la partie frontale interne d'une poche de recueil, sur la périphérie de l'ouverture de celle-ci.

The invention is described below with reference to the figures in the accompanying drawing plates, which illustrate it and in which:

• Fig. 1 shows a schematic sectional view of a variant of this device, also in place in an ostomy carrying a collection pocket, and associated therewith.
• Fig. 2 shows a schematic sectional view of a variant of the device of FIG. 1, in which the fixing of the oblong body is made sée on the internal front part of a collection bag, on the periphery of the opening thereof.

In the present context, the term "oblong body" (1) means any body having an axial symmetry of revolution and the maximum length of which is from 1 to 5 times the maximum diameter.

In practice, the largest diameter of the oblong body can be from 5 to 40 mm approximately, while its length can be for example from 5 to 50 mm approximately.

It should however be noted that it is not essential that this device, to be effective, have a perfect cylindrical shape. On the contrary, it is preferable to a device of cylindrical shape a substantially cylindrical device having at least one of its rounded ends, a substantially piriform device such as that of FIG. 1, a substantially frustoconical device having its large base connected by a rounded rest of body, etc.

Those skilled in the art are able to choose and select, from among all of the existing materials and materials, those which allow the device according to the invention to be produced.

The porous body with open cells (2) can be made of any material of this type, such as, for example, polymer or elastomeric foams, with open cells, felts or fabrics, but polyurethane foams are particularly preferred. with open cells.

As for the material of the envelope (3) of this porous body, it may be any material ensuring good sliding on the intestinal walls and in particular a natural or synthetic rubber of silicone, or more generally any flexible elastomer, but we can also produce this envelope in an elastic gel essentially produced from gelatin, glycerin and water, and which has the advantages of being bio-compatible and bio-degradable.

The device according to the invention comprises at its two ends, not necessarily in the axis of the oblong body, but despite everything in places which must not be in direct contact with the intestinal walls, openings, for example perforations or slots (4), of appropriate size and number. In practice, perforations of approximately 1 to 4 mm in diameter, or even slots the largest dimension of which is approximately 1 to 4 mm, are quite suitable.

The higher the number of openings, the smaller the size of these needs to be.

According to the variant shown diagrammatically in FIG. 1, however, the abovementioned oblong body has been provided, at its downstream end, with a hard or semi-flexible member (6) forming a rod whose end opposite the oblong body is flared at a disc fixed on the internal face of a collection pocket (7) opposite the opening that the latter comprises and which is applied to the mouth of the stoma, and opposite this opening, so that the device ejected into said pocket after a bowel movement can be, if desired, manually reinserted into the terminal part of the intestine, from where it will be again ejected during the following bowel movement.

In the variant illustrated schematically in Figure 2, which is similar to that of Figure 1, the hard or semi-flexible member (6), instead of being fixed on the wall of the collection bag (7) opposite the opening thereof, is made integral with the internal front part of the collection bag, on only part of the periphery of the opening thereof, less than the half-perimeter of this opening and located preferably in the portion of said opening which is the upper portion when the collection bag is carried by the user.

In these two variants, the attachment of the above-mentioned member (6) on the one hand to the oblong body (1) and on the other hand to the internal face concerned of the collection bag (7) can be ensured by any suitable means known to those skilled in the art, and in particular by gluing or welding.

Each of the above variants can be further improved, if desired, either by the introduction into the open cells of the porous material (2) of a charge of deodorizing material such as for example activated carbon, this charge of odor-absorbing material can be simply deposited in at least some of the cells of the porous material, or be fixed on their walls, for example by a suitable resin, or by replacing at least a part of the porous material (2) by such an absorbent material which , in the form of fibers, granules or the like, constitutes in itself the porous material.

The invention is illustrated more concretely in the exemplary embodiment below, which in no way limits it.

EXAMPLE

An oblong body is produced having an external diameter of 12 mm and a maximum length of 20 mm, by enclosing a polyurethane foam of suitable shape and dimensions in a capsule produced by means of an elastic gel obtained after heating at 120 ° C. for 15 minutes of a mixture of 50% by weight of water, 25% by weight of gelatin and 25% by weight of glycerin, and cooling, and in which three eccentric perforations of each have been provided at one of the rounded ends 1.5 mm in diameter and to the other a perforation of 4 mm in diameter, substantially in the axis thereof, these perforations making the porous open cell material communicate with the outside. In addition, this device is provided at the end carrying the three perforations with a member substantially in the form of a rod, the other end of which is flared and fixed by gluing to the internal wall of a collection bag for enterostomized and opposite the opening with which this pocket is provided.

This device has been tested: the oblong body has been introduced into the end of the intestine of an enterostomy patient and the collection bag has been placed. We could see the disappearance of noise emissions that we could however ter, in the same patient, at irregular intervals, when the latter was carrying a collection bag of the same type, but not comprising an oblong body according to the invention; in addition, this device has the advantage of being able to be manually reintroduced into the stoma after stool is passed.

Claims (5)

1. A collecting bag (7) for people having en- terostomas, characterized in that it comprises a device for reducing noises, detachable comprising an oblong body (1) of open-cell porous material (2), said body being sheathed in an outer casing (3) made of a material that does not adhere to stoma walls, said casing (3) comprising on each end at least an opening (4) suited for passing gases, and having at the end by said bag, a hard or partly flexible mean (6), especially a stem, which is ending in a disk that is either fixed on the collecting bag sheet, opposed to the collecting bag sheet opening which will be placed around the stoma, said disk being inside the bag, or bound through a portion of its surface to the collecting bag sheet containing the opening, said disk being inside the bag in this last case the binding area being at the periphery of the bag opening, said area being smaller than the opening half- perimeter, said area being, preferentially, in the part above the opening, when the collecting bag is used by the patient.

2. Device as claimed in claim 1, characterized in that the porous material (2) is open-cell polyurethane.

3. Device as claimed in claims 1 or 2, characterized in that the porous body casing (3) is made of flexible elastomeric compound, especially of natural or synthetic rubber.

4. Device as claimed in any claim 1 to 3 characterized in that the porous body casing (3) is made of elastic gel, produced for instance from gelatin, glycerine and water.

5. Device as claimed in any claim 1 to 4, characterized in that the openings (4) are perforations or slits, the largest size of which being from about 1 to 4 mm.

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